Matt Shanahan demands review of survey, defends frontline leave

Thank you for our guests for attending here today. Could I just make a comment, Chair, with respect to Mr Bell's statement regarding the survey? I think the committee should be writing out to the department to understand the basis of that survey and whether SIP2 members were excluded from it. I think if that proves to be the case, we should certainly be bringing it back into the committee again for further review. Ms Nia, can I just say it seems that we are at a little bit of a crossroads here. There are a number of issues that you have highlighted in your statements today. I would say the first thing, and I think most people in the room here would probably agree with me, I would say a large contribution would feel that parental leave and annual leave should be restored to frontline healthcare workers who have had to take that. But we do know that the schools are opening up, and therefore that the childcare issue for some, we would hope, frontline healthcare workers is going to be sorted from here on in. But in terms of what you are asking for, and you are asking, I think, for some kind of state-supported childcare initiatives going forward, which is going to be very difficult to do in terms of, as you outlined, 24 rostering. But have you developed any concrete proposals around that, or costed them, or had any discussion with the department on that? We have, and we have submitted to the Department of Health, and in the Freedom of Information, we see that it was considered, but not agreed to, in their correspondence, internal correspondence. And essentially, what we have said is, you know, healthcare workers will do their best, they will change their rosters, they will minimise the requirement on the state, as they have been doing. However, there will be a residual cost that the state must then look to cover, because it is not at all appropriate that the very worker who is going to work when everybody, most other citizens, were asked to cocoon and stay at home. And healthcare workers were singled out as those that were essential for the right reasons, and they then had a cost in addition to that, to the fear of that, to the, and I use the phrase brave, the actual bravery that they demonstrated throughout this. They did not flinch, but they should not have had to pay for that, as well as being that brave. Well, I would like to, and hopefully you will be able to provide those costings perhaps to the committee that we would be able to bring them forward to government. Can I ask you, in terms of, you said that there were approximately, I think you said 4,823 healthcare workers remain out sick. Do you have a profile on their return to work, if you please? So, in terms of, of their, we know that there's, for instance, some people suffer extreme fatigue after COVID, do you have any profile on when those people might return to work and how many in what time frame, please? We don't, Deputy, these are the figures we've sought, and this is the information we have sought from the HSE, and that's why we believe it is so centrally important that the Health and Safety Authority are involved in this conversation in a formal function. I see. Can I ask you also, you highlighted the differences of infection and healthcare workers between the public and the private sectors. Now, I think a lot of that is probably explainable in that COVID patients were not being directed to the private care facilities. But I think if a resurgence of COVID, I think we can expect outbreaks in the future, I would imagine that there will be a different streamlining of COVID patients. But do you think in terms of PPE, you mentioned donning and doffing, which is an issue I brought to the Health Minister some months ago, which was absolutely a significant aspect of the risk infection. Do you think that with the newer standards, with the understanding that the rate of infection of healthcare workers should, and I would assume it would, but do you feel it will drop in the area of COVID treatment in the future? Well, that's our aim. And I think I was asked earlier, what did we think affected it or caused it to be so high? And I think there were policies which were introduced, which we believe shouldn't have been introduced, one being the non-wearing of face masks. Also, we know that a policy was introduced when the workforce was under pressure to allow derogation of essential healthcare workers could return to work if they had been close contacts of positive, either positive people in the community or positive through their workplace. But they were derogated to return to work unless they developed a temperature. And again, we believe that was a mistake, considering what we now know, that asymptomatic people also could transmit. So, therefore, we believe that those policies obviously should be removed, that the face mask one is, the derogation is still there. But we believe that the HSE should very definitely issue a retraction of that policy, because they just simply cannot say that if you do not have a temperature, even though you've been a close contact, that you shouldn't self-isolate for 14 days like everybody else. Of course, of course, of course, of course, 14 days should be mandatory, whether you're a health care worker or an ordinary member of the public. First of all, just to help the last deputy and the previous deputy that spoke, in relation to a return to work protocol, the Health Service Executive are now working on a return to work protocol. Yet COVID-19 will still exist in the community and in the health service. And some big challenges are going to present in relation to return to work protocol, because some health workers, because of underlying issues, may be told that there is no work for them to return to. And this is a big question we're going to have to consider for all grades, whether it's an awesome midwifery, whether it's the ambulance service, support service, health care assistance. And that's the that's the really complex conversation that we're going to have to get into, because at the end of the day, if COVID-19 still exists and health workers have underlying health issues, these workers have got to be facilitated and they've got to be protected. Because it may not be just as easy of saying, well, we're going to reassign you to another post, and this has got to be grappled with by the policymakers in relation to occupational health. Some states in the European Union already see COVID-19 as an occupational disease, and we don't know why there's such resistance to why COVID-19 seen a 35% of all cases in the in our country relate to health workers. Why it's not seen as an occupational disease. In relation to face mask wearing, first of all, those working in the community, home care support assistance or health care or home helps, be very clear about this. This union, SIPTU, got to the stage where we had to source face masks for our own members to try basically shake the system where the HSE would respond to those workers in particular, because some colleagues were being granted PPE going to the homes of service users, while people in support staff grades or health care assistance grades were finding it's much more difficult to procure that particular type of safety equipment. So that's the steps that we had to take to protect our members. It seems that at this stage that members are receiving PPE, even though there have been issues about, I suppose, the availability and actually the quality of the equipment which the HSE have been trying to correct. So that's our contribution, Cairlach. Thank you, Mr. Thank you.